Is it possible to reinstall an older version of an emulator?

SpudsMcToole

I ask because like some sort of idiot I broke the cardinal rule of emulation - I updated an app that was already working fine.

I've gone from V3.1.0 of the Atari800 emulator to 4.0.0 (under the mistaken impression that the new version supported two fire buttons - that was actually someone's mod version that did that), and now it's a complete trainwreck of crashes, and won't run a whole bunch of games it ran fine before.

Is there an easy way to get back to 3.1.0? (Where by "easy" I mean "at no point involves typing the word sudo".)

mediamogul

@SpudsMcToole

Before exploring a downgrade, have you tried deleting your current /opt/retropie/configs/atari800/atari800.cfg file?

SpudsMcToole

@mediamogul Yep. I also tried copying back in my old 3.1.0 one, which I had a saved copy of, because I'd had to mess around with the new one's settings to fix the display. But neither helped.

mediamogul

@SpudsMcToole

Try launching a game, letting it crash and then post the contents of /dev/shm/runcommand.log.

SpudsMcToole

@mediamogul Nothing. I've uninstalled the emulator and deleted all the config files (which I had to do to repair it once before), rebooted the RPi, reinstalled the emulator and tried to run a game which definitely worked on the old version. It hangs on a blue screen making a farting noise and this is all the log has to say about it:

Parameters: 
Executing: /opt/retropie/emulators/atari800/bin/atari800 "/home/pi/RetroPie/roms/atari800/Sprint 1.atr"
Using Atari800 config file: /home/pi/.atari800.cfg
Created by Atari 800 Emulator, Version 4.0.0

Joystick 0 found
Joystick 1 found

I'm pretty sure I need the old version back. Can it be done?

mediamogul

@SpudsMcToole

You said previously that you tried reinstated a personal backup of 3.1.0. Could you do this again and report the contents of runcommand.log? Also, have you updated the underlying Raspbian OS anytime recently?

SpudsMcToole

@mediamogul No, I meant I copied in a version of ATARI800.CFG from the older version of the emulator, that I happened to have saved. Not the emulator itself.

Sadly I have no idea what "updated the underlying Raspbian OS" means.

mediamogul

@SpudsMcToole said in Is it possible to reinstall an older version of an emulator?:

Sadly I have no idea what "updated the underlying Raspbian OS" means.

When you do a full update from the RetroPie-Setup, it'll ask if you also want to update the underlying OS.

SpudsMcToole

@mediamogul Then no, I haven't, but it seems unlikely that that would affect only a handful of games in a single emulator update. Nothing else has had any problems.

Games which used to run but now crash (with links where public domain releases) include:

Bosconian (homebrew)
http://atariage.com/forums/topic/254670-bosconian-for-the-8-bits/?p=3577603

Spelunker

Sprint 1 (homebrew)
http://members.aon.at/nkehrer/sprint_a800.html

Tempest Xtreem Demo
http://www.atarimania.com/game-atari-400-800-xl-xe-tempest-xtreem_23225.html

Time Pilot (homebrew)
http://timepilot.atari.pl/download/tpilot.xex

If anyone can or can't run those on the latest version of the emulator I'd be interested to see your ATARI800.CFG file.

mediamogul

@SpudsMcToole

OK, lets see if 3.1.0 solves the problem. I believe the following command line entries will do the job:

curl https://raw.githubusercontent.com/RetroPie/RetroPie-Setup/67cdb4fcec3fa258f05f521969c90d456ea63f94/scriptmodules/emulators/atari800.sh -o  ~/RetroPie-Setup/scriptmodules/emulators/atari800.sh
curl https://raw.githubusercontent.com/RetroPie/RetroPie-Setup/67cdb4fcec3fa258f05f521969c90d456ea63f94/scriptmodules/emulators/atari800/01_rpi_fixes.diff -o  ~/RetroPie-Setup/scriptmodules/emulators/atari800/01_rpi_fixes.diff
sudo ~/RetroPie-Setup/retropie_setup.sh

Afterwards, just install Atari800 normally.

SpudsMcToole

@mediamogul Fortunately, in the last possible attempt before having to type lines like THAT, I got it all working by completely uninstalling, deleting all config files, reinstalling and then manually re-adding the lines from the old config that pointed to the BIOS files.

It was previously known that the emulator has something seriously screwy and unrecoverable going on if you somehow mess up the configs, the step I was missing was to put the BIOS lines back in. (Most games were working without them, which was why it took me a while to click what the problem was.)

Ta anyway :)

mediamogul

@SpudsMcToole said in Is it possible to reinstall an older version of an emulator?:

Fortunately, in the last possible attempt before having to type lines like THAT, I got it all working...

Very nice! Glad to hear everything's working now. Something to keep in mind for future endeavors is that no one actually types command lines like the ones listed above, as there would be too much margin for error. For situations like that, a quick copy and paste into a remote ssh session will save finger cramping and your sanity.